You Monster
by Lightning4022
Summary: 75 children were lucky enough to escape their first Hunger Games alive. But what about the 1,725 who died? This is the story of Darryl Wind, a young man who almost made it home.  This is a companion to the short story Another Face in the Sky.
1. Day 1

**Hello, this is lightning4022! This is my second story here on , and also a companion to my previous story, Another Face in the Sky. It is a companion because they share similar styles and ideas, but are not the same games. This is some obscure game unmentioned in The Hunger Games, like, say, the 30****th****. **

**Disclaimer: I do not own the Hunger Games**

**Thanks to my beta reader, sarahhaley, and my other editor, Isaac! You guys rock!**

60 seconds.

The moment I had feared all year was here, and this time I wasn't a spectator. _It's just a game, _the Capitol citizens told themselves. But for the 24 of us, we were playing for our lives. And I had an advantage, which was unusual for District 6. As a young man of 18, I was the oldest and strongest here, unless you count the other careers. I had a shot at survival, and I was definitely taking it.

15 seconds.

The arena wore the dry, tan sands of the desert like an old coat this year, and from what I could see it was enclosed by a giant, murky lake on the horizon. The golden Cornucopia shone in the hot sun, as a reminder that the Capitol had all of the wealth that they didn't deserve.

I found my allies on their starting places around the Cornucopia. Kenya from District 2 was three spaces away from me, and her brother Kurt was a few spaces to my left. District 1 and 4 were also spaced evenly around the ring. My district partner, Maddie, was directly across from me, glaring at me with eyes of hatred. Our eyes met, and I looked away, continuing to observe my surroundings before the timer ran out and we could start playing the game.

The starting pads were unusually close to the Cornucopia this year, which would provide for a messy bloodbath and a higher chance of victory for us.

GO!

I snapped out of my runner's crouch, adrenaline pumping, and sprinted to the pile of weapons, grabbed a sword, and threw a bow and quiver up to Opal from District 1. She had perched on top of the Cornucopia and was picking off tributes below with her excellent aim. The other six of us rushed into the battle on the ground, slashing and swinging at the other tributes.

I saw Pearlie from four lying in a pool of blood, and felt the small rush of joy one from the poor districts watching the Hunger Games always feels after seeing a career tribute get taken down, providing a higher chance of victory to the underdogs. I wondered if that was what people would feel if I died.

I shook myself, remembering that she was my ally, and I was now one of the menacing tributes our district hated so much.

_I'm doing this for Naomi back home,_ I told myself.

Caught back up in the heat of battle, I saw the girl from District 8 running away, so I caught up to her and delivered her a quick, hopefully painless death. I felt only the slightest bit of remorse, but knew that my conscience would catch up after the adrenaline wore off.

By this point, all of the tributes were either dead, or off in the distance running for their lives from us. It was terrible. Back home, everyone liked me, and I was scared to think of how everyone would see me if I returned home. _If._

Opal jumped down from the Cornucopia, and we all stepped back so the hovercraft could retrieve the bodies from the crime scene and ship them back to the districts.

_BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!____BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!_

The rest of the careers hooted and hollered at their success after the death toll was announced, and I was caught up in a sea of high-fives. I knew that Pearlie and the girl from 8 died, but I had no idea who the other cannons were for. I hoped that they weren't Maddie or her ally Donna.

I helped my allies pitch tents and distribute food and water from the Cornucopia. There were six of us left, and the food would easily last us a month if no one messed with it. The water, on the other hand, could be a problem. There would be enough to last six people who were like me for a week, but the other five were used to washing every day and having gallons of water during training. I figured we could last for four days before it ran out.

We slipped into silence and my mind drifted off. I had worked as a bodyguard for the mayor back home in District 6, and my family had always had enough to eat. My job had also left me skilled in hand to hand combat, which was what got me into this pack. I trained with swords during my stay in the Capitol, and was now fairly proficient. Obviously, I was good enough to kill an unarmed child. _What an accomplishment, _I thought to myself sarcastically, trying to fix the uneasiness growing in me. I decided to take my mind off of it and busy myself by taking inventory of our other supplies.

The air turned cold as the day went on, and a large silver parachute brought firewood and matches from the sky. The sponsors were betting on these guys to win, and I was glad that I was a part of it, if only so I didn't freeze. We planned our strategy for the games while we set up the fire, although, of course no one revealed our full plan, because it most certainly involved some backstabbing for all of us. I would just run away when I had a chance, after most of the contestants had lost this game.

The fake sky gradually faded to black, and the anthem played. Some of my allies actually sang along with their hands over their hearts, because their districts were pampered by the Capitol and had never endured the hardships the rest of us had. The song ended, and the sky lit up with faces.

Pearlie from 4, the only career down. With me to replace her, the pack was at the usual six, so none of my allies seemed at all bothered by her death.

The rest of the tributes in the sky, I thankfully didn't know.

The boy from 7, both from 8, both from 9, both from 11, and the girl from 12.

My wish had come true. Maddie and Donna were alive. Hopefully they would cross one of the bridges I had seen to whatever lay on the other side of the lake. To my knowledge, that was where everyone else had gone. We saw a few silhouettes in the desert after the bloodbath, but they were gone now, and we would just have to pursue them tomorrow.

We cooked our food around a fire and went into our tents to sleep. Opal and Kenya were taking guard tonight outside their small red tent, and the four guys went into a large gray one. I regarded my fellow tributes with interest as we prepared to sleep. In the center, taking up most of the space and complaining about the thread count of his sleeping bag, was Opal's district partner, Glint. I think the others would have killed him by now if he wasn't such an excellent tracker. In the corner, rolling his eyes at Glint and hiding a smirk, was Clayton. He was by far the most charismatic of the group, and although he was the weakest fighter, he had probably gotten us most of the sponsors with his perfect smile alone. He had recruited me, and we might have become friends if we didn't have to kill each other.

His polar opposite, Kurt, was already asleep in the back of the tent. He and Kenya were siblings, and had both volunteered, regardless of the fact that at least one of them would die. He was by far the strongest in the group, but also the quietest, and he only ever talked to his sister. In all honesty, I think he scared everyone, and no one wanted to leave him alone to guard.

We all settled down to sleep, hoping we wouldn't be stabbed in the night by someone. I sunk into a deep sleep, finally letting the guilt creep in.

_I killed someone today. _

**So, how did I do? Please reply! I will hopefully post a new chapter in a few days. **

**BYE!**


	2. Day 2

**Welcome, fellow Fanfiction addicts, to the second chapter of my second story! I posted this before my awesome editor Isaac could get to it, so I may make some modifications in a few days. I apologize for the wait; I actually had this chapter written about a week ago. But I didn't get it typed. Fortunately, sarahhaley nagged me to finish, and here it is!**  
><strong>Thanks go again to sarahhaley and… Isaac (<strong>**-**** sort of…)!**

I was at my own funeral, where my bloody, bandaged body lay in a coffin, wearing the suit I wore on the reaping day. My parents were there, tearing up at the loss of their only remaining child. My two best friends, Mark and Eric, were chatting and avoiding the casket, but occasionally their eyes would drift over my body, and their whole frame would shudder. They were surely remembering how I had looked before the games, my red hair clean and brushed, eyes always lit with happiness; nothing like the mangled corpse that they saw now.

Naomi came up to the coffin, screaming and crying with sadness only experienced by one who has lost their true love, asking the sky, "Why? _Why?_" She laid a single rose on my coffin, brushed my cheek, and started to turn away.

Before she could reach her seat, her beautiful blue eyes turned yellow, and her golden skin shriveled up and fell off, so that she was nothing but a skeleton in a wedding dress. When she exhaled, tongues of blue flame leapt out and burned my body and everything around the two of us. She stood up in the wreckage of our district and whispered in my lifeless ear, "_You promised_."

She vanished into thin air, like the ghosts from the scary stories I had read as a child. Then I woke up, sweat pouring into my newly opened eyes, panting, struggling to get out of my sleeping bag that now had a startling resemblance to a coffin, in my imagination.

_Naomi, my poor Naomi._

I had proposed to her on her birthday, a month ago, and we were going to get married this summer. This was our last year in the reaping and we had never taken any tesserae, so I had bet on our luck to not get reaped. I loved her more than anything, and when I was chosen I nearly died inside.  
>But Naomi had lost control, and was not able to keep her emotions to herself. She had leapt up onto the stage, shrieking at the Capitol escort who had called my name, trying to drag me off the stage, or volunteer for me, or do anything humanly possible to allow me to stay at home with her. Tears streaming down her beautiful face.<p>

When she had entered the Justice Building to bid me her final farewell, I promised her that I would do whatever it took so that we could be together again.  
>My nightmare reminded me of my promise and how I had to keep it. I crawled out of the tent, careful not to step on anyone, and stepped out into the dawn.<p>

Opal and Kenya were talking in hushed whispers by the fire pit we had made, and they silenced when I approached.

"Morning," I said, taking a few slices of bread and some peanut butter from the Cornucopia for breakfast.

"Hey. We just saw some tributes over to the east. Wake up the other guys, and we'll pay them a visit," said Opal, with authority. She had proclaimed herself as the leader of the group last night, and no one had objected yet. After all, she was the smartest and most prepared of the group, and her pretty blonde hair and bright green eyes made her attractive to our potential sponsors as well. She was also the most eager to be in these games- she had beaten down another girl who tried to volunteer, although something told me that it was because of something deeper than bloodlust.

I went back into the tent and shook Kurt, Glint, and Clayton awake.

"Get ready! We're going tribute hunting," I whispered harshly, trying to cover up the nervousness in my voice. I needed to survive, but I didn't want to kill anyone else. The girl from 8 had already been haunting me all day. She had such a great life ahead of her, and I had selfishly stolen it.

Everyone exited the tent, Glint muttering something about "beauty rest." We met the girls at the Cornucopia to choose our weapons. I picked up my bloodstained sword once again. I was in disgust with myself. I hated the brutality of these games. I wished that I had the courage to risk my life standing up to the Capitol, but I didn't. _ Naomi needed me._ That had become my mantra recently, and the thought of her watching at home was one of the few things keeping me from going insane.

We went into killer mode, as Opal pointed in the direction of our victims and Glint took the lead, using his tracking talents to search for footprints in the sand.  
>He got a trail, and we ran after him, trying to mute our clanking weapons so we wouldn't alert our prey. After about a mile of jogging, Clayton drew his katanas, preparing for the kill. Glint motioned to a sand dune, and we knew that behind it, the tributes were sleeping, unaware of their impending death. The kill would be easy, we figured, with barely a struggle. Until our luck changed.<p>

_BOOM!_

The sound of a cannon startled the birds in the distant jungle. And this death was not of our doing.

Normally, the death of another tribute would be a cause for celebration, after all, less work for us, but not now. Our quarry was surely awake now, and although we could still defeat them, there would be a higher chance of one of us getting injured. But we continued on for the last few yards of our trip.

Clayton jumped out at the tributes, a boy and girl who looked to be about 15 years old, and completely weaponless. They saw him, and began yelling with anger.

"Why do you play their game? You are people, just like us!" she shouted, "You have souls! You don't have to be a murderer! Just protest this game, then there's nothing they can do!"

The boy took a more direct approach, playing to Clayton's weakness.

"Do you really think that the Capitol citizens love you, just like they loved _everyone _in the games before? You're just a freak show that they bring out once a year for entertainment!" he tested, hoping that we would leave, "And all of that 'love' and 'respect' you think that you got? None of it was real! They don't love you, they won't care when you die! They're even worse than you are, but you don't have to be li-"

Clayton's face turned red, from anger or embarrassment we couldn't tell. He finally couldn't take the verbal attack anymore, and he killed the boy, and before the girl could even react, she was stabbed as well.

_BOOM! BOOM!_

Clayton's calm disposition was shattered by the realization that his audience didn't love him. He seemed very driven by people's impressions of him, even more than I did, and I felt bad for him for a moment, because he was genuinely hurt. He turned toward us, his blades glinting with crimson, and started slashing at Kurt, who was closest to him. Kurt easily parried all of the blows with his usual nonchalance, but Kenya feared for her brother, and tackled Clayton from behind, knocking him unconscious with the back of her mace.

Glint, Opal, and I stood, watching this scuffle play out. My allies were already fighting, which was not going to end well, and Clayton had officially gone crazy. The Capitol had now seen through to the madness that lay in all of my allies. I figured that our chances of sponsorship now were around half of what they were yesterday, which meant that our lack of water would be a huge problem soon. Not to mention the fact that there was someone else in the arena with an intent to kill, muttation or tribute I didn't know, and they would probably come for us next.

The hovercraft came from the sky to retrieve the two dead tributes, and we were all pulled out of our own little worlds, and back into the arena. Well, everyone except Clayton; he was still out cold, thanks to Kenya.

We gathered in a circle, and discussed our next move. The two tributes had a backpack with a full bottle of water and a sleeping bag. I put on the pack, and we hiked back to camp, Kurt and Kenya dragging Clayton's unconscious body all the way.

Another pang of remorse hit me, even though those two tributes hadn't been my kill. I remembered the sadness of seeing my sister in her baby sized coffin, when I was only 7. Many people in the district had lost family members in factory accidents, and seeing deaths televised had always struck us in the heart.

It was late afternoon by the time we were back at the Cornucopia, and everyone was tired and out of it. We hadn't left a guard this time, but next time we went out we would. Nobody in our alliance was especially bright, I suppose, and someone could have easily destroyed our supplies. Opal, of course, took the trouble to point this out, never missing a chance to quip at our intelligence.

Kurt and Kenya set Clayton down, and now took away his Katanas, cleaned them, put them in the Cornucopia, and tied him up, in case he woke up in another crazy fit.

Opal decided that three tributes were enough for one day, much to everyone's relief, and we spent the last few hours of the day packing bags for tribute hunting tomorrow. Monotonous evening was broken up by the faces in the sky, which always saddened me. After the anthem played, I learned that we had killed the district pair from 5, and that the other cannon had been the boy from 9.

Clayton woke up during the anthem, and didn't say anything until dinner, when he was untied and watched closely. He stood up and spoke.

"Sorry about earlier, you guys. I guess that kid was just kind of right. After all, most of us," he said with a pointed glance at me, "have trained for this for our entire lives. It has given us a sense of purpose, but for what? To grow up, kill some children, and if we're lucky, spend our lives alone, training other kids to follow in our footsteps?" with every sentence, he became faster, louder, and more emotional, until he seemed to be on the brink of tears, "But what about the other kids here? They wanted to be in this even less than we did! I mean, look at Darryl! He was going to get married! And now we're all secretly hoping that he dies so we can go home and be famous for a year! But why should we tolerate this?" He sat back down, and looked each of us in the eye, one at a time. We all stared at him for a few moments, absorbing everything he had said.

The Capitol had censored this speech for sure, and I had no idea if such things had been said like this in any other games. What he said was powerful, but also illegal, according to the Capitol. There was no doubt that we would pay all for his passionate speech, in the morning.

Opal cleared her throat, trying to ease the awkward silence that had fallen over the group.

"Well, it's getting late. We should set up a guard and the rest of us should sleep."

I volunteered for first watch, and once I was alone in the darkness, I whispered to the invisible cameras. "Naomi, if you can hear this, I want you to know how much I love you. I will come home, darling."

The black night offered no reply.

**So, how was it? Obviously, my estimates for these chapters are unreliable, but I think I will be done by next Wednesday. Let's see if I can do it! Also, one of my favorite authors, Heart the Squid, always mentions everyone who reviews to her chapters, so I guess I will too! Thanks to…**

**It-was-enchanting  
><strong>**sarahhaley**

**Please Review!**  
><strong>-lightning4022<strong>


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